Ashes to Ashes
by finnickodairology
Summary: Set after S5. Clarke has to face the aftermath of her actions in S5 and her friends rage. She now hopes to be the mother Madi deserves and the person that Monty and Harper believed deserved a second chance. But how does the rage of her friends fair with Bellamy and how does Clarke cope with it? Does she stand and justify her actions or does she take herself away from the equation?
1. Chapter 1

Clarke stood behind Bellamy as he stood and watched the new planet from the window. Jordan excused himself and went to get everything ready for everyone else and to give Clarke and Bellamy some space to grieve their friends, his parents.

"We need to wake them up." Bellamy gruffly announces into the silent room. "Raven, Murphy, Emori and Echo deserve to know about Monty and Harper. And we'll need to plan what to do next anyways. Anyone else you want to wake up?" He turns around to see her looking at him with concern.

"Madi. She's the new commander, she has the right to know what's going on. We'll need Shaw to help Raven with the controls and my mom. It's better to have some extra hands for any injuries, especially since Murphy's shoulder should still be recovering." Clarke mentions. "Should we wake up Octavia?" She suggests, furrowing her eyebrows as she glances at her former co-leader and best friend.

"No. There's only so much we can handle." He murmurs, sighing. "Now let's go wake up our friends." He gives her shoulder a gentle squeeze and leads them to the cryo room.

With everything that happened in the valley, Clarke knew that her friends would not be happy to see her and would want to receive the news about Monty and Harper as a family. Her heart still clenched at the thought of Harper and Monty, one of her closest friends from the drop ship and their absence. She also knew that her friends that went to the ring after Praimfaya had gotten closer without her and became a family, which she respected and acknowledged with a heavy heart.

"I think you should wake them up first and watch the video alone. Give them time to grieve. You guys were a family up there." Clarke says as they enter the room. "I'll wake the others up and catch them up to speed." Bellamy hesitates, noticing Clarke pulling away from him but nods and wakes them up.

"Why are you two the only ones awake?" Raven murmurs, glaring at Clarke as she gets out of her cryo pod. Clarke stiffens and decides to exit the room and wait back until everyone of Spacekru leaves the cryo room and heads to the bridge before she wakes up Madi, Shaw and her mother. She waited for them to wake up full and walked to Madi's pod and watched her eyes flutter open as they adjusted to the lights of the ship.

"Clarke. Where is everyone?" Madi mumbles, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

"Hey there my little _natblida_. I missed you so much." Clarke murmurs, pulling Madi into a big hug. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Shaw and Abby come out of their cryo pods and look around. She hesitates as she meets Shaw's gaze, uncertain whether the pilot was mad at Clarke or not. She sighed in relief as he nodded to her which she replied with a small smile. "They're all still asleep. There was a little problem along the way." She tells them as she and Madi walk towards them.

"Why am I not surprised?" Shaw says, looking around to see the hundreds of people still in cryo-sleep. "What happened?"

"Earth isn't coming back. Monty and Harper decided not to go into cryo-sleep and was watching Earth for years until they found out it isn't coming back. So Monty hacked into the Eligius 4 file and found out that their mission was to found another habitable planet. So they set the ships course to that planet, and here we are." Clarke explained, giving Madi's hand another squeeze for reassurance. "Monty left a video explaining everything. I'll take you to the bridge so you can watch it. Everyone's already there anyway."

"Raven?" Shaw asks expectantly.

"Already there."

—

"I can't believe they're gone." Raven whispers into Shaw's shoulder, his arm pulling her into his embrace protectively.

"They died to save us." Emori murmurs, eyes wide in disbelief as she stares out the window and watches the 2 suns orbit the new planet. "And now they're gone."

"I know we all miss Monty and Harper which is why we have to protect their legacy. They wanted us to have this second chance and we can't waste it." Bellamy says, squeezing Jordan's shoulder as he stands in front of the group. "We have to figure out what's happening down there. Raven, can you and Shaw see if anyone's actually living on that planet?"

"Sure, we'll see if we can intercept anything on the radio. The ship has laser comm so any radiation won't be a problem." Shaw says, as he and Raven sit down in front of the monitor and start checking the ships status.

"Okay that's good. We'll give it a few hours and then we'll send an exploratory team out." Bellamy says, his eyes flitting to Clarke's as he searches for assurance from her. She nods from the side and strokes Madi's hair as she blends further into the background. She knew that it was best for her to lay low in the mean time since everyone was angry with her. And she found some relief from it, as she wasn't asked to make any decisions regarding the welfare of the group and was able to pay attention to Madi's safety more.

"That's all peachy but we don't even know if the planet's radiation levels are safe for us? You really want to lead the group to a new planet just to die from radiation?" Raven says, looking at the Eligius files that Monty recovered. "For all we know, the Eligius team could've died from any radiation on the planet."

"Can't you send down a probe or something to check if the radiation levels are safe for us?" Murphy says, raising his eyebrows.

"No."

"Well then why can't we send out Clarke? She's a nightblood isn't she? If she survived Praimfaya then she should be able to survive this." Murphy says.

Bellamy stiffened at Murphy's idea. He knew that someone would suggest Clarke as soon as Raven mentioned the radiation. But could they really send Clarke, who sacrificed her life before Praimfaya for them, to risk her life for this? This was an easy choice for Bellamy. No way in hell was he losing her again, let alone sending her to her potential death. "It's too risky. She could die." Bellamy retorts, catching Murphy rolling his eyes at him.

"She's the reason we can't even go back to Earth in the first place. She should be the one to test this planet." Emori growls, shooting daggers at the young blonde at the back of the room.

"I said no. We don't sacrifice our own people."

"Bellamy, it's fine. I'll do it." Clarke says.

"Clarke, no! You can't." Madi whines, pulling Clarke's hand closer to her.

"Madi…" She sighs, pulling her into a hug.

"If you're going, I'm going too. I have nightblood as well." She says into her adoptive mothers embrace.

"_Heda _no. We cannot risk your life. You are too important." Echo tries to reason with her.

"No Madi, you have to stay here with them." Clarke says, pulling away from her daughter and raising Madi's chin. "I won't lose you too. I need you to stay here and be safe. If not for me then for your people. You and I both know that the commanders of the past would tell you to stay here." Clarke murmurs, brushing a strand of Madi's dark brown hair behind her ear.

"Clarke, I can't lose you too." She pleads, eyes watering causing Clarke to sigh and pull her into a tight hug. She knew her daughter would be opposed to the idea. She only had Clarke for 6 years after her parents died and she practically raised the dark haired commander. And to think that she might lose Clarke was practically clawing at her insides.

"You won't because Clarke isn't going." Bellamy says, causing Clarke's head to snap up as she catches him glaring at her. She rolls her eyes and shoots another glare of her own, challenging him to argue with her. She and him both knew that Clarke Griffin does not take order from anyone, especially him. That was the reason they both used to butt heads in the drop ship and they challenged each other.

"Bellamy, you can't expect us to risk our lives to check if the radiation is safe when we can just send Clarke to check this out." Echo says, placing her hand on Bellamy's bicep.

"It's fine Bellamy. I said I'll do it. I'll take the probe with me and check out the radiation levels and I'll bring a radio just in case. It's our best option. Shaw or Raven can operate the pod and stay behind the airlock and I'll explore and be back in a few hours." She says, ignoring his scowl. She instead takes a radio off the table and turns to Shaw. "Let me know when we're going, I'm going to pack." And with that, she leads a wary Madi away from her friends in the bridge.


	2. Chapter 2

Bellamy leaned against the wall at the very edge of the room, watching Clarke and Madi say their goodbyes while Shaw was getting the pod ready for their departure. He saw Clarke whispering into the young brunette and stroke her hair soothingly, making him remember when he used to do that to Octavia when she was little. Just as Madi gave her another quick hug and left, he walked up to her.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" He asked quietly, eyeing her warily.

"This needs to be done. Besides, this is our best bet." She shrugged, grabbing her pack from the floor and throwing it over her shoulder.

"You could get killed Clarke." He whispered, searching her eyes for any hesitation.

"I bear it so they don't have to." He hears her mutter under her breath, causing him to stiffen.

"Not all the time. You don't have to sacrifice yourself every time we face a problem. Stop being a martyr." He sighed, running his fingers through his hair in frustration.

"I was on the wrong side of the war on Earth, and I had to pay the price. Now let me make things right. We all have to do better."

"I can't lose you Clarke. Not again. Not after Monty and Harper." He rasped out as his voice wavered.

"I'll be okay. Just watch out for her. She needs you, even if she's too stubborn to admit it." She grabbed his hand softly to give it a gentle squeeze. "May we meet again." Clarke whispered underneath her breath and walked away, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

Bellamy paced in front of the doors, thinking about the girl he had left behind all those years ago to die. Who now faced that same risk of dying. He was angry at his friends for cornering her, even though they had their reasons for being mad at her. But he was most angered with Clarke, who was, once again, willing to sacrifice herself without thinking rationally. Sure, he survived 6 years without her on the ring, but that was because he didn't have a choice. But now Clarke was willingly putting herself in danger and Bellamy just couldn't wrap his head around it. He knew that she was doing the smart thing, risking only 1 life in return for more, and thinking with her head. But how could she possibly expect Bellamy to use his head in this situation, where she was putting herself in danger, making both Bellamy's head and heart shout at himself to stop her. Deciding he couldn't do anything by worrying about Clarke, Bellamy started walking to the bridge to help his friends. Just as he was entering the bridge, he could hear Jordan and Raven going over the schematics of the new planet. The Eligius files were displayed on the screen with the coordinates of the pod Shaw was piloting.

"Any news?" Bellamy asked, placing a hand behind Raven's seat.

"No. They'll be on the ground soon so we should hear from them in a few minutes." Raven sighed beside Bellamy and turned around to face him. "So, what's the plan?"

"Jordan, how long can we stay up here? Did your dad leave any further instructions?" Bellamy asked.

"Not really, he just said to wake you and Clarke first. But based on my calculations we should have enough algae for 2 weeks with just us. Waking up others would shorten the timespan of course." Jordan explained, offering a small smile to the group.

"Are we even planning on waking up anyone else?" Emori chimed in from the side.

"Any suggestions Madi?" Bellamy questioned, looking at the small girl observing the group from the back of the room with her adopted grandmother.

"I want to wake up Gaia. She should be able to teach me more about the flame. But other than her, I don't think we should wake anyone else before we know more from Clarke, especially since we have limited food." Bellamy winced slightly hearing Madi's voice, stripped from her usual childlike tone as she addressed the group as the commander and not Clarke's child.

"I agree with _heda_. We don't know who we can trust anymore. There are many people loyal to Octavia." Echo added, walking towards Bellamy and placing her hand on his shoulder.

"Okay, good. We'll wake Gaia and check with Clarke and Shaw afterwards. Abby, do you have the supplies to deal with Gaia's wounds?"

"Yes, there was a lot of medicine left in the med bay. And we already did surgery on Gaia's leg before we went into cryo sleep so it won't be a problem." Abby said.

"Alright then we should all head out and meet back here in an hour. Raven you'll let us know when they make contact?" Bellamy questioned, furrowing his eyebrows at his friend.

"Yeah, don't worry." Bellamy nodded and led Echo and the others out of the bridge to the mess hall to get some food. 125 years after a war without any food and all they had was algae. This should be great.

—

"Okay, just keep your radio with you and check in with us every 10 minutes okay? I don't need Bellamy chewing my head off when we get back because I couldn't keep a closer eye on you." Shaw joked, handing the pack over to Clarke. "The probe is pretty straight forward, just walk around with it and it should detect the radiation levels."

"I've got it Shaw, stop worrying so much."Clarke rolled her eyes and nodded, grabbing the pack from Shaw and closing the airlock doors.

"Okay, okay. Good luck out there." Shaw grinned, opening the pod doors from behind the airlock as he watched the sunlight slipping through from the opening doors.

"See you in a few hours." Clarke yelled, stepping off the ramp as she looked around her surrounding. The sun, or suns as she noted, was shining and the green plants around her caused a wave of nostalgia to hit her right in the chest as it reminded her of Earth. There were purple and yellow flowers surrounding the area, and trees as tall as she could see. The fresh air was so refreshing, and Clarke couldn't help but grin. "We made it." She whispered to herself, as she walked away from the pod and further into the clearing.

She took note of the lack of wildlife and checked the probe she brought with her. Yellow to green. _It's safe for them to come down._ Clarke sighed in relief as she put the probe back into her pack and pulled out her radio. "Hey, are you getting the readings?" She talked into the radio, looking at the pod from a distance.

"Yep. It's a bit high but we should all be able to handle it." Shaw answered, causing Clarke to grin. "Hey Raven, did you catch that?" Shaw's voice came out again.

"Yeah, copy that. We'll prep the others for further exploring when you guys get back." Clarke hears Raven say, and nods. Just as she was about to reply, she hears the grass rustle from behind the tree line as 4 figures came to her peripheral.

"Clarke, do you copy?" Bellamy's voice echoed from the radio. She stiffened at the 4 men walking from the tree line towards her. The men surrounded her, guns aimed at her head as she raised her hands in surrender, one still clutched to the radio.

"Clarke?"

"Don't move." One of the men said. He was a tall man, with broad shoulders and brown hair. He walked closer to her, clearly showing Clarke that he was their leader. He searched Clarke's body with his eyes, and when he saw no weapons he lowered his gun. "Who are you and how are you here?"

"I'm Clarke and I come from Earth." Clarke mentioned, eyeing the man warily. "And you are?"

"Dean. Captain of the guard." He said gruffly. "So Clarke, why have you come here?" He questioned, his stance relaxing as he figured that Clarke wasn't hostile and fully aware of his comrades on alert behind him.

"Earth is gone so we've come here to seek refuge." She said matter of factly, deciding it was best for her to keep quiet before she could discuss this with the others.

"Well I'm assuming you're coming in peace from the lack of weapons, but I can't be too sure on what to do until you talk to our leader." Dean muttered, raising his eyebrows.

"We've come in peace, that I can assure you. We've all dealt with war too many times on Earth and we've come searching for somewhere to rebuild." She informed them, watching the men behind Dean share looks of disbelief amongst themselves.

"We'll it looks like you'll have to talk to our leader before you and your people can do anything else." Dean said, glancing at his men to lower their weapons. "We'll take you to him."

Just as he was about to lead her towards the forest, the radio came on with some static. "Clarke, come in. Are you there?" Bellamy's voice broke the tension, causing Clarke to avert her gaze and bring the radio to her mouth.

"I'm fine Bellamy. I ran into some people." She said cautiously, eyeing her companions on the ground. "I'm here with the captain of the guard. They're leading me to speak to their leader."

"What? No. We should discuss this first and go together as a group." He said, his angry tone causing Clarke to sigh.

"Bellamy, there isn't time."

"Come back to the ship with Shaw and we'll talk to the leader together." He argued. Clarke shook her head and turned to Dean, who was looking curiously at her.

"Is it possible that I can go back to the ship?" Clarke asked, fully knowing that she wouldn't be allowed out of their sight.

"Unlikely." Dean muttered.

"Can I at least have my friends come with me to speak to your leader?" She retorted, furrowing her brows. She saw Dean think this through, and finally sighed as he reached his decision.

"Fine, but you're staying with us. And let's hope your friends don't get any ideas, because as of now, you're our hostage." He said, nodding to his comrades. Clarke nodded, and turned away as she spoke into the radio.

"Shaw can you hear me?"

"Yeah, I heard everything." Shaw answered.

"I need you to go back to the ship without me."

"What? Clarke, what are you doing?" Bellamy growled.

"Look, they won't let me leave. So Shaw will have to leave without me to get you and the others. Everything will be fine. We have to trust them and try not to meet everything with violence. Monty told us to do better right? Well, I'm trying to live up to that."

"Are you sure you're okay?" Shaw asked, concerned.

"I'll be fine. And Bellamy? Don't bring Madi yet." She said into the radio before she turned it off and walked back to the group of soldiers.


End file.
